Students fascinated with finances

Eileen FitzGerald

Published 10:56 pm, Sunday, January 26, 2014

Bill Lopez, a sales executive with an automobile insurance company, is the featured speaker Thursday morning during a talk about financial literacy at the Danbury High School. A project stemming from a business class at Danbury High School and developed into a DECA marketing class project, is presented to sophomores at the high school Thursday, January 16, 2014.
Photo: Carol Kaliff

Bill Lopez, a sales executive with an automobile insurance company,...

In the front row from left are, Katherine Colucci, 14, Rebecca Colucci, 17, and Delaney Flanagan, 15. The three girls, members of DECA, a marketing club, presented a program on financial literacy to sophomores at Danbury High School Thursday morning, January 16, 2014.
Photo: Carol Kaliff

Bill Lopez, a sales executive with an automobile insurance company, is the featured speaker Thursday morning during a talk about financial literacy at the Danbury High School. A project stemming from a business class at Danbury High School and developed into a DECA marketing class project, is presented to sophomores at the high school Thursday, January 16, 2014.
Photo: Carol Kaliff

Bill Lopez, a sales executive with an automobile insurance company,...

Listening to a talk about finacial literacy, and car insurance in particular, are from left, Gabriella Cardosa, 14, Marco Araujo, 16, and Eunique Dimmitt, 16. A project stemming from a business class at Danbury High School and developed into a DECA marketing class project, is presented to sophomores at the high school Thursday, January 16, 2014.
Photo: Carol Kaliff

Bill Lopez, a sales executive with an automobile insurance company, is the featured speaker Thursday morning during a talk about financial literacy at the Danbury High School. A project stemming from a business class at Danbury High School and developed into a DECA marketing class project, is presented to sophomores at the high school Thursday, January 16, 2014.
Photo: Carol Kaliff

DANBURY -- A freshman, sophomore and senior sat next to one another in their first business class at Danbury High School.

Its lessons in managing their personal finances were so powerful the three created a series of financial-literacy activities for the school's marketing club.

"It was an awakening experience to see that bills and finance would be part of my life in the future," sophomore Delany Flanagan,15, said. "I think it's a great class for students to take. Even when we put up the bulletin board that showed how to question needs versus wants, (it) was important. We're lucky to have a personal finance class at the high school. It's a very popular class."

Earlier this month, the trio invited sophomores to the auditorium to hear insurance agent Bill Lopez, of the Hodge-Ashmore Agency, discuss the financial effects accidents or driving violations have on insurance rates.

The students' other activities include a book they wrote for elementary students on entrepreneurial decision-making and a plan to hand out personal finance materials in three languages at a Jan. 31 fashion show they'll help run to benefit The Bridge to Independence and Career Opportunities, a nonprofit educationan and resource center that helps women returning to work.

In the wake of the Great Recession, financial literacy is getting a lot of attention.

Four states -- Utah, Missouri, Virginia and Tennessee -- require their schools to offer personal finance education. $mart Tennessee even offers financial education programs for kindergarteners. About half the states require financial education to be incorporated into other courses. In Wisconsin, the Department of Financial Institutions announced earlier this month it will provide $250,000 for a statewide program in personal finance in elementary, middle and high school.

Since 2007, Connecticut legislators have unsuccessfully introduced seven bills in an attempt to bring financial education into the schools.

Even states with no requirements, like Connecticut, are starting to offer financial-literacy education. At Danbury High School, about 300 students take a personal-finance class each year, and personal-finance topics are included in the introduction to business classes as well.

Danbury's financial literacy classes are filled with students in grades 9 through 12.

"When you're teaching the class, the students are totally engaged," Danbury High business teacher Sue Schullery said.

"You're talking about their lives -- from a student who is going on to college and has to figure out how to pay, and another one who wants to be able to afford an apartment when they graduate from high school. It's all real to them."

The importance of saving was a huge lesson freshman Katherine Colucci, 14, embraced in her first business class.

"Saving your money is key in your life," she said. "They say you can't buy happiness, but you need money to buy anything, so if you don't save you won't have anything."

Last summer, the Center for Financial Literacy at Champlain College in Burlington, Vt., released grades for all 50 states on the states' efforts to teach the ABCs of financial literacy to high school students. Connecticut received an F because it does not require local districts to require financial education.

"Anecdotally, the feedback from parents and teachers is that it is a good idea to teach financial literacy in the schools, but with increased school demands and reduced budgets it's difficult to do," Laura Levine, president of the Jump$Start Coalition, said.

No formalized financial-literacy program was underway when Jump$Start was founded in 1995. The interest in financial education arose from the National Endowment of Financial Literacy, Junior Achievement and a couple of top leaders in the credit industry when they saw credit was easy to get, but people didn't know how to manage it.

The next burst of interest in personal-finance education came in 2006, as people struggled financially, especially with mortgages they couldn't afford.

"Those are the two waves that propelled us," Levine said. "As a movement, we are less than two decades old. We're still in the early stages of development, but we're here to stay."

Jump$Start has always been focused on teacher training, she said, and is working on math and language arts lessons for the new Common Core standards.

Around the world, interest is growing in educating young people about personal finances. Some countries are ahead of the U.S., and some struggle like the U.S. because there is no single mandate, Levine said.

Child and Youth Finance International, which was launched in April 2012, taps the expertise and innovation of the world's leading financial institutions, international non-governmental agencies and foundations.

Its central objective is giving all students ages 8 to 18 the knowledge to make financial decisions, earn a livelihood and ultimately break the cycle of poverty.

Global Money Week is one of the group's activities. In 2013, more than one million children from 80 countries took part in activities that ranged from visits to banks to art exhibits on money and banking.

Some people have reservations about the value of financial literacy courses.

A recent report by three professors called "Financial Literacy, Financial Education and Downstream Financial Behaviors" found financial education decays over time. Instead, they suggest "just-in-time" financial education tied to specific issues, like how to choose a mortgage.